Saturday, July 7, 2012

O-oh! You might call it the BO-Anti-Midas effect. It seems to have started yesterday and I sure hope it doesn’t hang around. It’s sort of like the Gore-effect, only with far wider range than just the weather. Although make no mistake – it was as hot as Hades: Al Gore would kill to have this kind of weather associated with his name.

It feels like the gates of Hell have been thrown open, doesn’t it? Welcome to my world. Regards, Al

The trouble beganshortly after breakfast yesterday: bacon, eggs and grits at Ann’s Place in Akron (actually this was BO’ssecond breakfast, having started the day with a healthy breakfast of salmon and sea bass at the Hilton). Sadly, Ann, who showed up to be hugged by Big Guy in the parking lot,succumbed to the heat, humidity, excitement and her bad ticker just a few hours later. Big Guy sent his sincere condolences.

Butt seriously guys, this type of reaction isn’t exactly what we’re looking for here. Swooning, fine; sobbing, great, butt actually expiring? Not so good. The campaign team will be working harder to keep this sort of thing under the radar. So when you read about some of our true believers “fainting” at future campaign events, it could be they bit it. Please don’t pass that on though. In the wrong hands (I’m talking Fox News) this could be made to look bad.

Anyway, then the Big Black Canadian Bus (BBCB) was on to Summer Garden Manufacturing, a "Green LEED Certified" plant in Boardman Ohio that uses local ingredients to make and bottles private label marinara sauces; including Molto Mario’s - a big fan of Big Guy - and Lady M!

The plant tour started off well enough, with Big Guy demonstrating his arugula-certified organic food snob rating: he sniffed the air and declared he detected the scent of oregano wafting in the morning air.

It takes a special kind of nose to smell oregano amidst a simmering vat of tomatoes, onions and garlic

Of course, Big Guy is more of a connoisseur and gourmand than an actual cook, so what would he actually know about the smell of simmering garlic?

Unfortunately, while the linemen at the marinara plant were having their pictures taken with BO, the Anti-Midas touch hit again; the packing machine behind them got jammed and since nobody noticed the entire line shut down. That caused a little overtime for the crew: stimulating more job activity!

Next up, an "unscheduled" stop for the BBCB at Kretchmar's Bakery in the picturesque town of Beaver. I guess if I had been the advance team I might have looked for a pie shop in a picturesque town that also had a picturesque name. Butt apparently we have a big campaign donor in Beaver.

“Maybe I’ll get some cookies,” he added. “Press, do you want some cookies?”

Pool reporters were noncommittal.

“Will you consider this a bribe once again?” said Obama. “Why don’t we get a dozen chocolate chip cookies and send them on the press bus, and I won’t know if you guys ate them, all right? I know the photographers will eat them. Those guys have no shame.”

Obama paid for pie and cookies with a crisp $20, and told employees to keep the change. [ed. unfortunately the cookies cost $21, butt that’s ok, staff covered for him1] After he returned to the bus, campaign officials trotted over to the media vehicle and delivered the promised goods.

As if the pool had to be could be bribed to write good press anyway! That’s a joke. Right?

Of course with all this sudden Anti-Midas Touch stuff going on, the main message of Big Guy’s battleground state tour sort of got lost: that it’s the economy, stupid! And we have finally taken a step in the right direction as far as job generation is concerned! 84,000 jobs created in just one month!

Okay, so we need about 135,000 per month just to keep up with population growth. And 360,000 new jobs per month in order to get us back to 6% unemployment – in THREE YEARS!?! Yikes, if that’s a step in the right direction I think I’d requisition a new GPS.

By afternoon though Big Guy had already nuanced his stance on the job creation picture,

“That’s right! We’ve added the fewest number of jobs in nearly 4 years, butt don’t read to much into that dude.”

June 2012: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report and it is informative to consider each report in the context of other data that are becoming available.” (LINK)

May 2012: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report and it is helpful to consider each report in the context of other data that are becoming available.” (LINK)

April 2012: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report and it is helpful to consider each report in the context of other data that are becoming available.” (LINK)

March 2012: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report, and it is helpful to consider each report in the context of other data that are becoming available.” (LINK)

February 2012: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report; nevertheless, the trend in job market indicators over recent months is an encouraging sign.” (LINK)

January 2012: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report; nevertheless, the trend in job market indicators over recent months is an encouraging sign.” (LINK)

December 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

November 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

October 2011: “The monthly employment and unemployment numbers are volatile and employment estimates are subject to substantial revision. There is no better example than August’s jobs figure, which was initially reported at zero and in the latest revision increased to 104,000. This illustrates why the Administration always stresses it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

September 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

August 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

July 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

June 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

May 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

April 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

March 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

February 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

January 2011: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

December 2010: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

November 2010: “Therefore, as the Administration always stresses, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

October 2010: “Given the volatility in monthly employment and unemployment data, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

September 2010: “Given the volatility in the monthly employment and unemployment data, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report.” (LINK)

July 2010: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report, positive or negative. It is essential that we continue our efforts to move in the right direction and replace job losses with robust job gains.” (LINK)

August 2010: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report, positive or negative.” (LINK)

June 2010: “As always, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report, positive or negative.” (LINK)

May 2010: “As always, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report, positive or negative.” (LINK)

April 2010: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report, positive or negative.” (LINK)

March 2010: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report, positive or negative.” (LINK)

January 2010: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report, positive or negative.” (LINK)

November 2009: “Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report, positive or negative.” (LINK)

Forward. Don’t read to much into it:

It could be a trap.

And so we wrap up another road trip with the Real Obots of the Battleground States and shuttle the BBCB back to the garage until such time as we once again deem it necessary to hit the trail to gamble with America!